The Recent Haul

It was another of those weeks when books seem to pop up wherever I went. It escaped my mind to write here about the book I found the previous Sunday. I had found a book that I already had but had given away for reason I cannot comprehend now. I had found Edward Abbey’s ‘Desert Solitaire’ a couple of years ago at Abids. When I picked it up I was not aware that it was a well known title. Only after I bought it and also read it did I discover that it was in a list of top travel titles on World Hum, the travel site. But a couple of months ago I gave it away unwittingly and realized it too late. But last Sunday I found a different copy of the same book and surprisingly with the same seller and at the same price i.e., Twenty rupees.

Sometime during the week I happened to drop in at Frankfurt Books at Begumpet. There I saw two Robert B Parker’s Spenser titles- ‘Pastime’ and ‘Cold Service’ that I wasted no time in buying at Rs 50 each which was a bit high considering the price at which I got another Spenser title this Sunday. Last Sunday, Uma who was with me spotted another Spenser title- ‘Double Deuce’ for which he paid only twenty rupees. What was surprising was that this copy of Double Deuce was an almost brand new copy with the jacket intact. Uma was generous enough to give the book to me. Thanks, Uma.

Then on Friday last I dropped in at the Best Books sale at YMCA for a final see as I thought that 26th Jan was the last day of the sale. I was surprised to discover that the sale has been extended upto 5th February. If you haven’t been there go now before I pick up all the good books. I saw a lot of good books but they were all priced above a hundred and fifty rupees. I thought I wouldn’t be able to find any book for less than hundred rupees but I was wrong. I saw Ashokamitran’s ‘The Eighteenth Parallel’ and was surprised that it was priced at only forty rupees. But the real surprise was finding it was a copy signed by the author, Ashokamitran, himself to someone.

I leafed through the book and found that it was a story about the events that rocked Hyderabad around 1947 during the Nizam’s rule. There were many familiar places like Monda, Keyes Girls High School and such places mentioned in the book. I had not known that Hyderabad featured in novels other than those written by Narendra Luther. ‘The Eighteenth Parallel’ was translated into English from Tamil was Gomathi Narayanan. According to the copy on the back cover TEP is considered one of Ashokamitran’s finest works of fiction and it also won the Ilakkia Chintanai Book-of-the-Year Award in 1977. It was also chosen by National Book Trust of India for translation into several Indian Languages. I wonder if there is a Telugu translation of this book. However, I am extremely pleased with myself for spotting this book which I plan to read right away.

Another book that came to me recently was Dr Parchuri Gopala Krishna’s book on Telugu Films, Story and Screenplays that Srinath lent to me when I met him at HLF. I have already begun to read it and there is a lot of fascinating stuff about the early years of film making not only in the country but also in Tollywood.